


Searching

by protect-him (protect_him)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: M/M, merfenders, mermaid au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-08 12:59:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12254883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/protect_him/pseuds/protect-him
Summary: Doing an inktober writing project to write a little "drabble" each day (a long drabble). This is day 1, and the prompt was "Searching"Written in my merfendersThrough Glassuniverse, in case there's any confusion regarding the setting.





	Searching

Fenris awoke in the darkness and saw with large glassy eyes that Anders was still asleep.

The other mer looked so calm in his sleep. Fenris wondered if he looked similar. It was not the morning to be lingering in the little nest that they shared, though. Yesterday Anders had explained the concept of “gift” and had  _ given _ Fenris a shiny gold metal bracelet for his wrist. It was stiff, with an opening just wide enough for him to slide his arm through. Fenris slid gracefully from their little nest and paused to admire the gold against his skin.

Anders would sleep a while longer yet, and Fenris needed to go out before he woke up. He knew he needed to find the perfect gift to compensate for this beautiful gold bauble.

As Fenris left the cave, he was startled by a brush against his tail fin. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Justice wriggling after him.

“Jussis,” he said, quietly, with a smile. He knew that wasn’t quite the right word, but speaking was still difficult for him. The words were so foreign, but came so easily to Anders.

Justice came up and nudged him questioningly.

“Anners’ giff,” Fenris said, by way of explanation, showing his gold bangle to the shark. “Fenners giff Anners.”

But what?

Anders’ gift was beautiful. Gold and shiny. It fit Fenris perfectly. How would he find a gift to rival it? He didn’t even know how Anders had found this one.

The only place to find treasures was on the ocean floor, so once he’d traveled some distance from the cave, he dove down, Justice following him.

There were plenty of interesting things to see here. Fenris chittered and happily darted towards a big pretty object, only to realize with shock that it was a live crab, which snapped at his fingers as he jerked away.

The sun was coming up above the ocean, and the sunlight made those things which shone glitter even more brightly. Fenris darted back and forth from one shining object to another, frowning as he found many broken shells, as well as countless pieces of  shattered bottles and other human litter.

“Tarash,” Fenris said aloud to Justice, tossing aside yet another bright candy wrapper. If he sounded out the word slowly, it sounded almost like the way Anders said it.

The shark nudged aside sand with his nose as well, helping Fenris sift through all the bright and shiny things he was finding.

“No fing!” Fenris complained to the shark after what seemed like a long time of searching and finding nothing that would be a suitable gift.

He abandoned this stretch of soft white sand and swam some distance to another spot north of their cave where the ocean floor was more shallow and the beach and floor more rocky.

There were more little creatures around this area, small crabs and fish hiding in the rock crevices and beneath them when Fenris grunted, wriggling and pushing hard to flip the rocks over. Justice tried to help a little, but with nothing more than just his head and floppy fins, there was little he could do. He playfully chased the little fish he liked to feed on and snatched a few, though he hunted mostly at night while Anders and Fenris slept.

More searching in this area turned up even less promising spoils than the last spot. Fenris glanced up at the sun slanting into the water and began to worry. Anders would be waking up soon. He looked down at the bangle on his wrist. He needed to quickly find a gift for Anders!

“No fing here,” Fenris said mournfully, looking to Justice.

Justice’s nose bobbed in a sort of nod and he turned about and hurried in another direction. Eagerly, Fenris swam after him.

He was a little nervous as Justice took him into deeper water, but there was no strong current, and Fenris still hadn’t swam far or tired himself yet this morning. Justice began to root his nose into the heavier, more grainy sand here deeper under the water, stirring up milky clouds.

Still unsure exactly what they were looking for, Fenris did the same with his hands, moving across the sand and trying to shift it aside, looking for...something. A gift for Anders.

“Jussis!” He wriggled excitedly, his tail floating up above his head as he burrowed into the sand, head down, so that he got sand in his hair and on his face. He came up triumphant, holding a shiny pink shell of a peculiar shape.

Fenris would not have known how to describe it, but the shell was of a common shape, pointed at the bottom, quickly expanding into a wide top that would have been an inverted triangle, but that it had a pair of humps on the top of it.

“Anners giff!” Fenris exclaimed proudly, brushing off the remains of the sand on the shell. It did indeed reflect the sunlight, having a mostly smooth pink surface, somewhat ridged and slightly rough and pockmarked with weathering. The concave underside was pearly and flawless, sparkling brilliantly in the sunshine.

It was perfect. Absolutely perfect. Fenris hurried back to the cave to find Anders just leaving it, looking almost frantic.

“Fenris! Where were you?”

Fenris stared back with wide eyes, his hands quickly going behind his back.

“I thought perhaps something had happened,” Anders explained, dodging forward to hug Fenris’s shoulders and nuzzle at his neck. Fenris purred at the touch, letting go of the shell with one hand so he could put an arm around Anders as well.

“What were you doing up?” Anders asked finally, now composed enough to run his fingers through his hair and tie it back with the small twine tie he had been using since Fenris had first met him not long ago, when Anders had risked climbing onto land to help free Fenris from the small pool where he’d been raised nearly from birth as a captive mer.

“Searching,” Fenris replied, and presented Anders with the shell. “Anners’ gift!”

Anders eyes widened with delight and surprise.

“You went and found me a gift!’ He held the shell like it was the most precious thing he’d ever held. “Fenris, it’s beautiful. A heart!”

“Heart?”

“The shape.” Anders held it up. “This is a heart. It’s very pretty.” He smiled, knowing that he couldn’t quite explain the concept of love yet. Fenris would perhaps understand, but Anders wasn’t quite sure if  _ he _ was ready for the questions and explanations that would need to follow. Both Fenris and himself needed more time before they had a conversation about love. And Fenris might need more vocabulary. Anders went to his nest and tucked the shell beneath the soft bedding on the side where he slept. If nothing else, the gift was touching, especially in that Fenris had gone out early to find it himself and surprise Anders. Anders had never received a gift that he would treasure more than the little heart-shaped shell from Fenris.


End file.
